"Come on, you don't think anyone *else* is going to try to kill me between now and June."
That was worth looking away from the road for a moment, to give Mitch the full benefit of his best unimpressed stare. The spidery scars on the side of his face, the ones that looked like circuitry and probably were, flickered with green light; he was using his powers on something, maybe important, maybe not. They looked like they'd feel hard, like little wires laid into the side of his face, but they didn't; they felt like any other scar tissue. Rick had checked Mitch for skull fractures and other assorted head injuries often enough to know.
"I'm gonna consider us lucky if the list of people who try to kill you between now and June is only in the single digits," he said. "You just seem to inspire something in people."
"Admiration?" Mitch deadpanned.
"Homicidal rage."
"But you still love me, right?"
Rick turned back to the road, where the traffic had suddenly lessen dramatically as the stoplights blinked a bright, friendly green all along their immediate route. "Don't bet on it, boss," he shot back. This wasn't a moment for the truth. There might never be the right moment for it.
"You guys love me, though, right?" Mitch asked, very quietly but in that special tone of voice that always made Rick's filling buzz.
The car radio, which had been playing Johnny Cash at a barely audible level, emitted a bust of static. When it cleared, it was playing jazz.
"So, was that a yes, or did my car's electronics just break up with you?"
"I think they want to 'just be friends.'"
"I hate to break it to you, boss, but I suspect you make a better friend than you do a boyfriend, considering your record." Which was pretty shakey on both counts, actually, but if friendship was measured in trust, then what he and Mitch had definately counted. He made sure to remind himself of that occasionally, and to remind himself not to push for too much and screw things up.
On the worst day of their lives, when thousands of lives had been at stake and Mitch had, from what Rick could tell, truly expected that he might die, he'd used one of the tiny fragments of concentration he could spare to call Rick and say goodbye.
That meant something. Maybe it just meant that Rick had been the only person left whom he *could* call, but he didn't think so.
He wasn't sure Mitch could even do romance anymore, but he'd take what he could get.
The Mermaid Parade is real, BTW. You couldn't make that kind of thing up.
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Ex Machina ficlet, part 3
Date: 2009-04-30 07:35 pm (UTC)That was worth looking away from the road for a moment, to give Mitch the full benefit of his best unimpressed stare. The spidery scars on the side of his face, the ones that looked like circuitry and probably were, flickered with green light; he was using his powers on something, maybe important, maybe not. They looked like they'd feel hard, like little wires laid into the side of his face, but they didn't; they felt like any other scar tissue. Rick had checked Mitch for skull fractures and other assorted head injuries often enough to know.
"I'm gonna consider us lucky if the list of people who try to kill you between now and June is only in the single digits," he said. "You just seem to inspire something in people."
"Admiration?" Mitch deadpanned.
"Homicidal rage."
"But you still love me, right?"
Rick turned back to the road, where the traffic had suddenly lessen dramatically as the stoplights blinked a bright, friendly green all along their immediate route. "Don't bet on it, boss," he shot back. This wasn't a moment for the truth. There might never be the right moment for it.
"You guys love me, though, right?" Mitch asked, very quietly but in that special tone of voice that always made Rick's filling buzz.
The car radio, which had been playing Johnny Cash at a barely audible level, emitted a bust of static. When it cleared, it was playing jazz.
"So, was that a yes, or did my car's electronics just break up with you?"
"I think they want to 'just be friends.'"
"I hate to break it to you, boss, but I suspect you make a better friend than you do a boyfriend, considering your record." Which was pretty shakey on both counts, actually, but if friendship was measured in trust, then what he and Mitch had definately counted. He made sure to remind himself of that occasionally, and to remind himself not to push for too much and screw things up.
On the worst day of their lives, when thousands of lives had been at stake and Mitch had, from what Rick could tell, truly expected that he might die, he'd used one of the tiny fragments of concentration he could spare to call Rick and say goodbye.
That meant something. Maybe it just meant that Rick had been the only person left whom he *could* call, but he didn't think so.
He wasn't sure Mitch could even do romance anymore, but he'd take what he could get.
The Mermaid Parade is real, BTW. You couldn't make that kind of thing up.